Amade M’charek is Professor Anthropology of Science at the department of
Anthropology of the University of Amsterdam. Her research interests are in
forensics, forensic anthropology and race. She is the PI of the project
Dutchness in Genes and Genealogy, a project examining how Dutchness is enacted
in collaborations between population geneticists, archaeologists and
genealogists. M’charek is also the PI of the project Sexuality & Diversity
in the Making. She is the founding chair of the
European
Network for the Social Studies of Forensics (EUnetSSF) and the convenor of
the seminar series Ir/relevance
of Race in Science and Society. Her most recent research is on face making
and race making in forensic identification, for which she received a five-year
ERC consolidator grant in December 2013.

Completed

Victor Toom: “A DNA Profile’s Capacity of Rights: On the Interference
between Science and the Law in Forensic DNA Practice in the Netherlands"
(2010; At present, Fellow, Northumbria University Centre for Forensic Science
(NUCFS)

Externally Funded Research Projects

2014. European Research Council
Consolidator Grant:

"Race Matter: On the Absent Presence of Race in
Forensic Identification" (RaceFaceID)

In many European countries race is a taboo subject. Due to colonialism and
WWII, studying race is delegated to the realm of ‘bad science’ or declared
irrelevant all together. Yet, current biomedicine and forensic practices are
co-shaped by techniques that depend on and explore differences between human
populations. In the process, these techniques reintroduce and shape race in both
science and society. But this is not done upfront. In Europe race has become an
absent presence, an object that pops up, e.g. in discourse, to then hide in
seemingly unproblematic techniques, e.g in genetic markers. The proposed
research seeks to open up for study this double move, in which ‘race’ gets
configured but not discussed.

This is an ethnographic study of race in forensic identification, focusing on
practices of giving face to unknown individuals. Although the face is generally
viewed as the ultimate individual identifier, in practice individuality cannot
be achieved without situating an individual in a population (M’charek 2000).
Studying race in forensic practice today is highly relevant, since forensics
constitutes one of the major domains where science and society interact.

The chief objective of our research is to explore how a) technologies of
identification rely on and reiterate racial ways of understanding differences;
how b) the version of race enacted in the process changes as knowledge travels
across forensic sites; and c) which mechanisms contribute to the
absent-presentness of race. We study three different technologies of
identifications through in-depth multi-sited ethnographies (Marcus 1995): (1)
the frontier science of genetic facial phenotying (e.g. the inference of facial
form, hair, skin and iris colour from DNA); (2) the established technologies of
craniofacial reconstruction (based on the skull); and (3) facial composite. We
therein examine how knowledge travels from forensic laboratories to courtrooms,
also from the forensic laboratories to so-called Research and Development sites.

2013. Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Sexualiteit Research Project:

"Sexualities and Diversities in the Making"

Adolescent sexuality is mostly discussed and researched in relation to risks
and dangers- as defined from an adult point of view. This does not yield
information about the daily practices, pleasures and problems with regard to
sexuality that adolescents experience themselves. Moreover, in societal
discussions sexual development, gender equality and adolescents’ attitude
towards homosexuality are often seen as problematic, in particular in relation
to multicultural diversity. Earlier, mostly quantitative research, reproduces
existing stereotypes by defining categories of diversity beforehand, instead of
attending to the dynamics of identities.

This pioneering qualitative research project investigates how young people in
the Netherlands from different backgrounds enact their sexuality and the way
this is affected by and has an effect on the differences and similarities they
produce among themselves. It examines how different spaces in which adolescents
live their lives, in particular school and social media, limit or enable their
possibilities to explore, experience, protect, develop or display their
sexuality and sexual identity.

This ethnographic study will contribute with novel insight about

(1) the perspective of young people on their sexuality;

(2) the way particular spaces enable or limit the diversity of sexual
identities;

(3) the entwinement of sexuality with diversity and other identities.

These insights will be disseminated to professionals and the public using
various media.

2011 - 2013. Center for Society and the Life Sciences Research Project:

"Genes, Brains and Criminality in Context: Assessment of knowledge
development in genomics and neurobiology and the transfer thereof into
psychiatric forensic practice"

The Dutch Ministry of Justice wants neurobiological and behavioral genetic
knowledge, in addition to social scientific and scientific legal knowledge, to
be given a place in research, policy and practice. The ultimate goal is to
achieve a science-based practice of prevention, investigation and justice in
order to reduce serious crime figures and lower recidivism. (Kogel, 2008) In
connection with this, the Dutch Institute for Forensic Psychiatry and Psychology
(NIFP) is busy assessing the extent to which new neuropsychological,
neurobiological and genetic knowledge and techniques are applicable in forensic
diagnostics for the judiciary and the TBS-sector. In keeping with this, the
forensic psychiatric observation clinic of the Ministry of Justice, the Pieter
Baan Centre (PBC) has started a neuropsychological research project for
diagnostic purposes and hopes to start additional behavioral genetic research in
the near future (Blok 2010).

An important challenge within this context of forensic diagnostics, is the
alignment between questions from legal practice and possibilities from science
and technology. This involves the search for connections between new genetic and
neurobiological knowledge and insights and policy- and practical questions
related to accountability, the risk of recidivism and treatment options. The aim
is to develop objectifying techniques, for example, to make a distinction
between impulsive- and intentional aggressive disorders in suspects as a means
to the end of improving the quality of risk-profiles and risk-management. In the
first group of disorders people have less control of their own behavior and
aggression than in the latter.

A risk-profile should be meaningful for the individual case under survey.
Genetic information might then provide an additional component in the appraisal
process, to support other findings. But to be able to think through the
consequences of this addition to the legal practice, it is important to first
have a clear picture of how the current prognostic risk profiles
(non-genetically) are performed and what forensic psychiatrists and
psychologists, judges, prosecutors, and lawyers do with and value the findings.
Subsequently, the following question should be addressed; how and under what
conditions might genetic knowledge and insights be used in two important areas
of justice, namely prevention and the judicial process?

A first step here is to identify and clarify experiences and expectations of
the forensic psychiatrists and psychologists, and, of judges, prosecutors, and
lawyers regarding the application and implications of genetic
knowledge in these diverse areas of legal practice. The use of knowledge about
genes and the brain will have implications for the judicial process. However,
there is much uncertainty about how to proceed and what this knowledge might
entail. What can be seen as an opportunity to produce risk profiles and analyses
with greater certainty, by e.g. forensic investigators and criminal intelligence
units (police) may not be viewed in the same way by judges and lawyers. How,
then do the different actors involved assess the consequences of using genetic
knowledge and insights in terms of opportunities and/or dilemma’s?

Race Matter: On the Absent Presence of Race in Forensic Identification
(RaceFaceID)

In many European countries race is a taboo subject. Due to colonialism and
WWII, studying race is delegated to the realm of ‘bad science’ or declared
irrelevant all together. Yet, current biomedicine and forensic practices are
co-shaped by techniques that depend on and explore differences between human
populations. In the process, these techniques reintroduce and shape race in both
science and society. But this is not done upfront. In Europe race has become an
absent presence, an object that pops up, e.g. in discourse to then hide
in seemingly unproblematic techniques, e.g. in genetic markers. The RaceFaceID
research project seeks to open up for study this double move, in which ‘race’
gets configured but not discussed.

The RaceFaceID project is an ethnographic study of race in forensic
identification, in which the focus is on practices of giving a face to an
unknown individual, a suspect or a victim. Although the face is generally viewed
as the ultimate individual identifier, in practice individuality cannot be
achieved without situating an individual in a population (M’charek 2000). Rather
than defining race, we follow the relation between the individual and the
population in practice and attend to instances in which this relation is
translated, and wherein population comes to stand for race.

The chief objective of the RaceFaceID project is to explore a) how
technologies of identification rely on and reiterate racial ways of
understanding differences; b) how the version of race enacted in the process
changes as knowledge travels across forensic sites; and c) which mechanisms
contribute to the absent-presentness of race. We study three different
technologies of identifications through in-depth multi-sited
ethnographies (Marcus 1995): (1) the frontier science of genetic facial
phenotying (e.g. the inference of facial form, hair, skin and iris colour
from DNA); (2) the established technologies of craniofacial reconstruction
(facial reconstruction based on the skull); and (3) the classical
facial composite (either based on sketching or computerised photofit).
We therein examine how knowledge travels from forensic laboratories to
courtrooms, also from the forensic laboratories to so-called Research and
Development sites.

Guiding the RaceFaceID project is the overarching question: How is race
enacted in forensic practices? A series of sub-questions will address the
answer:

a) How do various technologies of identification in- and outside the
laboratory enact race?
b) How do versions of race change as they move between practices?
c) What mechanisms work to make race an absent presence?
d) What concepts are apt to theoretically grasp the name- and shape-changing
nature of race?

The project aims to develop a theoretical and methodological framework for
studying race-in-practice. The framework is aimed at advancing our knowledge
about the ways race is enacted through and materializes in technologies. It thus
aims at advancing our understanding of the materiality of race in practice, not
by reducing race to biology or the body, but by tracing ethnographically how
race is configured as specific relations between the biological, the social and
the technical.

The project also aims to shed light on how the traffic of knowledge between
sites implies that race is translated and made relevant in a variety of ways. To
date, studies into racial configurations have concentrated on scientific
settings (laboratory or clinic) or on sites where the sciences are marginal.
This project will move beyond this by following the trajectory along which
knowledge and technology move across diverse sites, in and out of the
laboratory. It will detail how versions of race are enacted and the
socio-technical relations that need to be in place to do that.

Finally, it aims to advance social science by studying race as an absent
presence, an object that tends to hide in seemingly unproblematic
categories or in the technologies and routines of science. We will not focus on
discourses (indeed the word ‘race’ often remains unspoken) but on
practices and meticulously examine how race, even if not articulated,
is still enacted and embedded in ways of working and in technologies.

Studying race in forensic practice today is highly relevant, since forensics
constitutes one of the major domains where science and society interact.

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M'charek, A. (2000). Technologies of population: Forensic DNA testing
practices and the making of differences and
similarities. Configurations, 8(1), 121-158.

2015

M'Charek, A., & Keller, G. (2015). Parenthood and kinship in IVF for humans and animals: on traveling bits of life in the age of genetics. In A. M. Smelik, & N. Lykke (Eds.), Bits of life: feminism at the intersections of media, bioscience, and technology. - Hbk. ed. (pp. 61-78). (In vivo). Seattle and London: University of Washington Press. [details]

M'charek, A., & Keller, G. (2008). Parenthood and kinship in IVF for humans and animals: On traveling bits of life in the age of genetics. In A. Smelik, & N. Lykke (Eds.), Bits of life: Feminism at the intersections of media, bioscience, and technology (pp. 61-78). (In vivo). Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press. [details]

2014

M'charek, A. (2014). YseX Is a Matter of Concern Rather Than a Matter of Fact [Review of: S.S. Richardson (2013) Sex itself: the search for male and female in the human genome]. Science, 343(6712), 731-732. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1249293[details]

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (23-4-2017). Face, Crime and the Migrant Other: On the Absent Presence of Race in the Media, Seminar ‘Racial Exclusion in and at the Borders of Europe’, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

M'charek, A. (invited speaker) (13-6-2014). Guest lecture "The trouble with race and the absent presence thereof in forensic identification", for the course The Body in Feminist Theory and Practice, Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands.

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (2-6-2014). (Sur)Face: On Generous Methods in Studies of Race, APT 2014: Power in a World of Becoming, Entanglement &amp; Attachment, University of Warwick.

M'charek, A. (invited speaker) (25-4-2014). Guest lecture "ANT or a sociology of transition", for the course Sociologische theorie 4: Perspectief on een nieuwe synthese, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (15-10-2010). The Materiality of Race: Or how to do history with bones and DNA, invited paper delivered at the Gender in Practice Conference (Center for Genderstudies, University Nijmegen), Nijmegen.

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (5-9-2010). Performing the Technoscientific Body: On the materiality of Race in Practice, Keynote address at the bi-annual Conference of EASST (the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology) 2-5 September 2010, Trento, Italy.

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (7-7-2010). The HeLa Error: On the aesthetics of wholeness and the materiality of race, invited paper at LOST research colloquium at the Max Planck Institute, Halle, Germany.

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (28-5-2010). The Materiality of Race: Or how to do history with bones and DNA, invited paper at the 10 Years After Conference organised by the Center for Society and Genomics, Amsterdam.

M'charek, A. A. (invited speaker) (16-12-2009). When whiteness becomes a problem: A case of neo-natal care in the Netherlands, Conference Paper at Distributed Bodies: Practices of disability and chronic disease, University of Amsterdam.

M'charek, A. A. (organiser) (21-1-2010). Organizer of the international workshop "The Ir/relevance of race in the anthropology of (bio)medical practices" (January 21st, 2010, University of Amsterdam), Amsterdam (organising a conference, workshop, ...).

M'charek, A. A. (participant) (20-1-2010). AISSR international workshop, Amsterdam. The Ir/relevance of Race in Science and Society (participating in a conference, workshop, ...).

M'charek, A. A. (other) (2010 - 2013). Advisor, International Research Project: Immigene: Social, political and ethical implications of DNA analysis for family reunification, University of Frankfurt (other).